


death is for other people

by natalunasans



Series: The Gates of Commitment Unwired [5]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Dysfunctional Relationships, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt, F/F, Nightmares, Nonbinary Character, Other, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-09-19 18:18:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17006730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natalunasans/pseuds/natalunasans
Summary: The Master needs to sort out her feelings about the Doctor.





	death is for other people

**Author's Note:**

> i don't know where this is going. i'm mainly posting it to try and force myself to figure out what comes next   
> o_o

 

> The Master awakes to the unmistakable sound of glass shrinking. She sits up in her bed, and then, hastily wrapped in a duvet, crawls under it. There’s so much dust under here… and spiders. Bollocks of Rassilon, there’re probably spiders in her hair right now. Her entire skin itches at the very concept of their sticky nets and little prickly feet, let alone their admittedly unlikely sting.
> 
> The glass cage in the center of the Vault continues its inexorable treacle-slow implosion. She doesn’t manage to wonder why it’s her bed in there and not her piano: the question tickles her mind but ultimately hides itself. The Master, though, cannot hide herself. The cage has shrunk to the size of the bed, now, and if it keeps going… a few bits of ‘antique’ wood are not going to be enough of a barrier. A few more pings… one more crunch…
> 
> The last thing she hears is the taste of orange blood; the last thing she feels is an electric-blue smell.

 

She’s pinned down. They’ve got a grip on her shoulders. The wrong hands. 

The Master finally opens her eyes to see the Doctor, but not _that_ Doctor, swim into focus.

“Are you okay?!” They’re shaking her, yellow hair flopping at either side of their new, softer face, now squinched-up in concern. “You were screaming again…”

The Master closes her eyes again and rolls over, curling into herself, away from the Doctor’s now-loosened grasp.

Now they’re going to want to hug her. It’s not that she doesn’t _long_ to dive for their open arms, burrow so far into the shelter of their warmth that everything else disappears… if only…

“It’s alright for some,” the Master mutters. Why couldn’t _she_ have regenerated as well?! Plenty of memories she’d like softened or even erased. Well, maybe not erased… the sense of their parallel lives is what keeps her going, but why have they always _always_ got to be just enough out of sync to ruin it?!

The Doctor’s taken the hint, for once, and backs off. “Sorry, sorry. See you at breakfast, though?”

The Master makes a noncommittal noise and pulls the covers up over her head. As soon as the Doctor’s footsteps fade, she peeks one eye out to make sure she’s still in their TARDIS, with the weird new walls like cemetery carvings -- but the Doctor seems to love it and that’s what matters.

The Master had hoped to make the Vault _her_ TARDIS, but that didn’t quite go to plan. But then, with the Doctor, when has anything _ever_ gone according to the Master's intricate schemes?


End file.
